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Dont own a watanabe, but do own a Kumagoro. Was one of my first jknives. Still reach for it and enjoy using it. Have had it rehandled, looks nice, cuts well.

I also have the Kumagoro 240,put a Steph.handle on it.It is a large 240 seems bigger,used it quite a bit at work holds an edge well.Not a Lazor,more of a beefy workhorse blade.They have gone up in price since I bought mine 4yrs. ago.To me it is a cool looking knife as well.

All your picks are good,whatever BS larger Gyuto you get,I think you will like the steel.

Wow, thanks for all the great info! Funny you should mention Kochi, as this guy has also caught my attention, and the price isn't nearly the leap it would be to the Watanabe. How concerned should I be about cleaning/maintaining a "reactive" Kurouchi blade? The finish doesn't look too rough, but I don't want something I'm going to have to scrub for five minutes every time I use it.

The kurouchi finish actually helps to make that part of the blade less reactive...meaning the only real patina taking place is below this--the area where the cladding meats the core steel. The finish on mine is relatively smooth with just enough material there to help reduce stiction. I find the V2 not be extremely reactive, no smell though it does produce good color. It requires no more or less maintenance than any of my other carbon knives--actually the same care I would give a stainless knife.

Good luck!

once in a while you get shown the light, in the strangest of places if you look at it right

After looking at around at everyone's suggestions (JCK took a while, since I hadn't been there before), and watching Jon's video about the Kochi knives, I think I'm fairly convinced about a Kochi. Unfortunately, he's out of stock, so I'm going to have to wait, and maybe work on a sharpening setup.

Originally Posted by Pensacola Tiger

What makes you think the Yoshikane tamamoku is thick? It's no willowy laser but it is not in any sense a thick knife. It compares very favorably to a Shigefusa.

Rick

If I recall, it's right around 5mm at the handle and ~4mm at the heel. Honestly, I was just surprised by this profile, and I thought a typical number was ~3mm without so much beefing up at the back.

If I recall, it's right around 5mm at the handle and ~4mm at the heel. Honestly, I was just surprised by this profile, and I thought a typical number was ~3mm without so much beefing up at the back.

It's a forged knife, and the thickness at the handle is meaningless - it's an artifact of the process of making the knife. It has no effect on the geometry of the knife. Neither is the thickness of the spine by itself a good indicator of how a knife will perform. Of much more importance is the grind - is there a distal taper, how thin is the knife behind the edge, is the blade flat ground or convexed? I once had a custom chef's knife that was, for all intents and purposes, a flat plate of steel with no perceptible grind at all. It had a sub 3mm spine, so by your criteria, it should have performed well, but it was one of the worst performing knives I've had the misfortune to use.

Unfortunately, it is difficult to measure these things but easy to measure spine thickness, so spine thickness has become an easy way to compare knives, although not a very useful one, in my experience. The same thing happened with Rockwell hardness where it was widely held that the higher the HRc the better, but thankfully that has lost its popularity.

The worst part of all of this is that there is really no good way to evaluate a knife other than through someone else's opinion or by actually using the knife. My suggestion is to get to the point where you can participate in some of the passarounds that are offered at KKF so you can use a knife for a week and evaluate it. If you don't mind some additional expense, buy a knife, and if it doesn't meet your criteria, sell it on B/S/T - you will lose about 20% of what the knife cost new, but, as someone once remarked, you can look at that as the cost to "rent" the knife.

It's a forged knife, and the thickness at the handle is meaningless - it's an artifact of the process of making the knife. It has no effect on the geometry of the knife. Neither is the thickness of the spine by itself a good indicator of how a knife will perform. Of much more importance is the grind - is there a distal taper, how thin is the knife behind the edge, is the blade flat ground or convexed? I once had a custom chef's knife that was, for all intents and purposes, a flat plate of steel with no perceptible grind at all. It had a sub 3mm spine, so by your criteria, it should have performed well, but it was one of the worst performing knives I've had the misfortune to use.

Unfortunately, it is difficult to measure these things but easy to measure spine thickness, so spine thickness has become an easy way to compare knives, although not a very useful one, in my experience. The same thing happened with Rockwell hardness where it was widely held that the higher the HRc the better, but thankfully that has lost its popularity.

The worst part of all of this is that there is really no good way to evaluate a knife other than through someone else's opinion or by actually using the knife. My suggestion is to get to the point where you can participate in some of the passarounds that are offered at KKF so you can use a knife for a week and evaluate it. If you don't mind some additional expense, buy a knife, and if it doesn't meet your criteria, sell it on B/S/T - you will lose about 20% of what the knife cost new, but, as someone once remarked, you can look at that as the cost to "rent" the knife.

Some helpful info for sure. I wasn't trying to give the impression that I didn't think it would perform well. I can trust that custom makers with generations of experience know better than a rank newcomer such as myself what comprises a superior knife. Still, it strikes me as a curious shape, and I would love to get my hands on a knife like the Yoshikane so I can get a feel for it. That said, I don't know that I feel confident enough yet to buy something like this without holding it, particularly since it's quite a price jump.

Some helpful info for sure. I wasn't trying to give the impression that I didn't think it would perform well. I can trust that custom makers with generations of experience know better than a rank newcomer such as myself what comprises a superior knife. Still, it strikes me as a curious shape, and I would love to get my hands on a knife like the Yoshikane so I can get a feel for it. That said, I don't know that I feel confident enough yet to buy something like this without holding it, particularly since it's quite a price jump.